I had this discussion with a friend, and we really couldn’t reach a consensus.
My friend thinks Lemmy (and other Reddit-like platforms) is social media because you’re interacting with other people, liking/disliking submissions, and all the content is user-generated.
I think it isn’t because you’re not following individual people, just communities/topics. Though I concede there are some aspects of social media present, I feel that overall it’s not because my view of social media is that you’re primarily following individuals.
In my view, these link aggregator + comment platforms are more like an evolution of forums which both my friend and I agreed don’t meet the criteria to be considered social media (though they maintain that Reddit-like platforms are social media while I do not).
So I’m asking Lemmy now to weigh in to help settle this friendly debate.
Edit: Thanks everyone! From the comments, it sounds like my friend and I are both right and both wrong. lol. Feel free to keep chiming in, but I have to go do the 9-5 thing that pays my mortgage and cloud hosting bills.
It’s all social media as the content of the site is generated by users interacting with each other.
The difference you’ve identified is between individualist & content-focused social media.
Most networks are the individualist kind, you follow people and they post about their lives for the most part
Reddit & lemmy are primarily content focused social media as you follow topics and post about them
It’s media where you interact with other people. So yeah.
Yes. I also consider forums to be social media, but the good kind.
Fell like it could be used as social media, but I tend to use it as a forum
Op you can follow Reddit and Lemmy users just the same as on Facebook or Twitter. So by your own definition, Reddit and Lemmy are forms of social media.
Yes, they just don’t do the whole personal algorithm thing.
I don’t think they are, they’re more akin to forums.
In my mind, social media is where you follow people and people broadcast their lives. That’s the social aspect of it.
With Reddit and Lemmy we follow communities on topics we’re interested in.
I do get the arguments for it to be social media but that just makes the category way too broad, as you could argue any site with a comment section is social media.
as you could argue any site with a comment section is social media.
I disagree with that. If the main purpose of your site is not interaction, so it cannot be a social media. Lemmy, Reddit, Kbin and other platforms like that has the main purpose share of knowledge and interaction between peers
For example, I may have a blog and this blog has a comment section in my posts. However, despite people can interact with each other in the comment section, the main purpose of my blog is post my own content. The interaction between people is secondary and consequence.
But in Lemmy the main purpose is interact. If not enough people participate, Lemmy dies. There is no other reason to use Lemmy other than interact with people.
you could argue any site with a comment section is social media.
Which I would, tbh, although it’s a limited form of SM, since sharing of top level content is very restricted to those with control of the site.
It’s in the same class IMO as sites which are more open, like Lemmy/Reddit/FB/Twitter - they are perhaps more focused on SM as a primary function, while comment sections are a secondary aspect of, say, a news site. But the presence of shared discussion of whatever topic is at the top makes them SM for me.
To me they are social media.
You can also follow topics/communities on other platforms, and on Reddit you can follow people/accounts.
There’s not much difference.
Yeah it’s more like a sliding scale where some platforms are deeply about following people, and some about topics, but I’m the end it’s all social media.
I think one aspect OP didn’t talk about is anonymity, for me the biggest differentiator is that on lemmy/Reddit you have no idea who the accounts are most of the time (and more importantly, nobody knows who you are).
I think they’re antisocial media. Reddit more than lemmy, though, which feels a bit like a community sometimes.
Not exactly. Lemmy (like Reddit) is a social news/link aggregator. So it’s not social media per se, but it’s certainly social media adjacent.
Lmao because you changed media to news/links it’s somehow adjacent?
I can’t believe the number of comments like this one. All these online platforms are social media
Social media websites and applications that enable users to create and share content or to participate in social networking.
Lemme isn’t a social network like Facebook or Instagram or TikTok
Facebook isn’t like instagram, instagram isn’t like tiktok, tiktok isn’t like lemmy, Lemmy isn’t like Twitter, but they are all social media.
When people find communities like making bread or wtv and share tips and pictures, that’s networking. Plenty of support communities too.
Most create content, and post it publicly for other social circles to see their media. It’s social media lol
Most create content, and post it publicly for other social circles to see their media. It’s social media lol
this isnt even kind of true. most users of these systems post nothing. the content posters are a very small, valuable contingent compared to the lurkers/viewers.
Yeah that’s a badly written sentence. “Most post for other social circles to see their media when they create content”.
Doesn’t change the arguments that this is social media. Lemmings and reditors just like to feel special
so the term social media involves any written word where more than one person can see it. got it.
Essentially , but that wouldn’t be totally correct, youre framing it that way to make a strawman. The definition is:
Social media websites and applications that enable users to create and share content or to participate in social networking.
So written words, shared on a platform made to exchange words and images publicly for others to discuss/comment on, if you really don’t want to use the dictionary.
you’re using a pretty arbitrary definition for your opinion, and i disagree.
Ah yes, the arbitrary definitions of the dictionary are my opinion. Well formed argument
Being petulant and throwing a tantrum isn’t really a good argument either.
So now i’m “throwing a tantrum” because saying I was inventing definitions (from the dictionary) didn’t work. Seems like youre the one throwing a tantrum because you were wrong. My argument is fine and far from pedantic. Saying “news and links” aren’t “media” is what’s pedantic
Many people here are being incredibly pedantic about the words “social media”, forgetting entirely that “social media” is a term invented to describe a certain type of website. Forums existed before the term was being widely used, for example, and whilst they would fit a dictionary definition of the words within the term they were always considered a separate entity to what was established as being ‘social media’ (e.g.: Myspace, Bebo, Facebook, etc.).
I’m with you, OP.
This. Maybe I’m getting old but I really get frustrated when people start calling everything social media. In particular, I keep hearing people group YouTube and communicators like Discord or even freaking WhatsApp under this label.
Primarily anonymous forum style communication are social media like bicycles, scooters, and skateboards are vehicles.
Technically yes, but not really what people think about when they talk about vehicles.
So, I think forums are a form of social media, so trying to say this is a forum and not social media isn’t a good argument for me.
I’ve never seen Reddit as social media, more like a forum. Though I felt it was getting more like social media in recent years. But in one discussion such as this is was pointed out that forums pretty much are social media, they just existed before the term existed.
Then it dawned on me. Reddit didn’t become more like social media - it always was one. It was just the enshitification that made it more like the other social media that I was noticing.
Lemmy is medium through which we are having social interactions. So yeah.
My thoughts is that I come here for content, not people, so there’s no social aspect to it.
I do not, while yes you can socialize I think it intended to be used as an aggregator unlike other sites. Much like you can discuss(forum) and shop in other social media sites.
